Half-size Elephant Parade replicas on display, sale

"Baby Corn" is a half-size version of one of the 38 life-size baby elephant statues in the Elephant Parade in Dana Point. Reclamation in San Clemente bought the replica to help raise awareness of the event and its beneficiary, the Asian Elephant Foundation. The store plans to raffle "Baby Corn" in a few months, with most of the proceeds going to the foundation. LUKE RAMSETH, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER

Tribute-size elephant

What: "Baby Corn," a half-size replica of "Corn" by Nat Posilla. It's one of eight half-size copies of current Elephant Parade statues.

Elephant Parade auction

Half-size versions of the colorful painted elephant statues that have dotted Dana Point for the Elephant Parade art exhibition and fundraiser are turning up outside the city.

A “tribute” version of Nat Posilla’s “Corn,” an elephant sculpture that looks like an ear of corn, has been on display the past month in the window of Reclamation, a décor store in San Clemente.

“Baby Corn” is a tribute-sized, or half-sized, replica of “Corn,” one of only eight such tributes from the current Elephant Parade. Reclamation owner Louise Mayer-Grodski and her husband, David, brought “Baby Corn” to their San Clemente store after Elephant Parade ambassador Dana Yarger pitched the idea to them.

Mayer-Grodski, a Dana Point resident, said she loves the Elephant Parade and has been visiting each statue and posting pictures on her Facebook page. She said she was inspired to help spread awareness about the parade after hearing about Mosha, a baby Asian elephant that was fitted with a prosthesis after losing a leg when an abandoned land mine exploded. Buying “Baby Corn” gave her and her husband the opportunity to do that. The parade aids the Asian Elephant Foundation, a preservation group.

“A lot of people don’t really leave San Clemente and some people just didn’t know it was going on,” Mayer-Grodski said. “People now have come into the store and said, ‘It’s a cute elephant; what is it?’ So bringing (‘Baby Corn’) into the window has really created a lot of awareness.”

Every morning her husband cleans the outside of the window because there are lip and nose marks from people pressing against the window to look at the statue, she said.

The couple plan to display the statue – which they bought from the Elephant Parade for $5,000 – for the next few months and then hold a raffle for it, with most of the proceeds going to the foundation, Mayer-Grodski said.

“He needs to have a good home because he’s just the cutest one ever,” she said.

At the start of the Elephant Parade in August, the tribute herd consisted of reproductions of elephants in past parades. But some of the statues for Dana Point’s parade were finished early enough that they could be re-created in half-size versions, said Elephant Parade producer Matt McNally.

This is the first time an Elephant Parade, which has been held in cities around the world since 2006, has featured tributes of statues in the current exhibition, McNally said. The newer herd was created to show off more of the artworks since there aren’t as many life-size statues as in past parades, he said. The Dana Point parade has 38 life-size statues; past parades have pushed 100, he said.

In a little more than two weeks, the exhibition will bid farewell to Dana Point. On Nov. 12, the elephants will be reunited at Lantern Bay Park for a series of events including meet-and-greets with some of the artists and presentations by scientists and conservationists.

The full-size statues are available to buy now or at an auction Nov. 17. McNally said he expects 15 to 20 of the statues to be available for the auction at the Laguna Cliffs resort, as well as some of the tribute herd. The others likely will have been sold by then, he said.

Those interested in buying tribute or life-size elephants or tickets to the auction can email auction@elephantparade.com.

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"Baby Corn" is a half-size version of one of the 38 life-size baby elephant statues in the Elephant Parade in Dana Point. Reclamation in San Clemente bought the replica to help raise awareness of the event and its beneficiary, the Asian Elephant Foundation. The store plans to raffle "Baby Corn" in a few months, with most of the proceeds going to the foundation. LUKE RAMSETH, ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Elephant Parade ambassador Dana Yarger poses with statues of various sizes. EUGENE GARCIA, REGISTER FILE PHOTO
Some of the statues in the Elephant Parade outdoor art exhibition in Dana Point are displayed at a kickoff event in August. DAVID BRO, REGISTER FILE PHOTO

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